


Marrissey In A Coffee Shop

by flowercrownclem



Category: The Smiths
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-01
Updated: 2015-01-01
Packaged: 2018-03-04 16:04:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3073868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowercrownclem/pseuds/flowercrownclem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Johnny works at a coffee shop and Steven works at the library and they're in love. Fluffy and cliché.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks you the18thpaledescendant for helping with the plot.

Johnny Maher leaned casually against the wall, draped over the counter of the coffee shop with his guitar perched across his lap. He strummed absently, lost in thought as the sounds of the shop lulled around him. Mugs clinked as spoons stirred and patrons made light conversation.  
He was pulled from his thoughts as the door was pushed gently open, ringing the bright-sounding bell over the frame. Johnny remembered the time- just after eleven- and grinned.  
He stood up, setting aside his instrument and meeting the eyes of the entering customer.  
Quiff-boy, as Johnny had come to think of him, had been there almost every day around that time of morning for weeks. There was always a book in his hand and a pair of thick NHS specs on the bridge of his nose.  
"The usual?" Johnny asked, already getting a teacup ready with hot water.  
"I wasn't aware that I had one," Quiff-boy told him cheekily.  
"You've ordered ceylon tea nearly every time you've come in," Johnny replied, rolling his eyes with a smile.  
"You never know, perhaps I just came in for the ambiance this time."  
Johnny looked around at the small shop, lit by dusty windows and fading lamps. The corners were stuffed with old couches and cracked tables, and the rest of the place was dotted with a few studying college students and one couple who were using one couch to make out graphically.  
"Oi! It's eleven o'clock in the morning! Do it in your own home!" Johnny called to them before turning back to Quiff-boy. "Really?"  
"No, I just wanted tea and I'm not supposed to eat or drink in the library so I might as well drink it here."  
"Do you work in a library?" Johnny asked.  
"Yes, the one down the street," he explained, gesturing in the direction.  
A librarian, huh? Johnny thought, setting a steaming cup of tea on the counter between them. That explains why he dresses like my grandfather.   
"Thank you," Quiff-boy said, paying him and taking the drink over to the couch opposite the one recently vacated by the couple.  
"Any time," Johnny told him as he watched him open his book. The heavy leather-bound book was labeled to be "The Collective Works of Oscar Wilde."   
Johnny pulled his guitar back onto his lap, playing softly as he watched the boy read, occasionally pausing to sip his drink. Soon, Johnny's random chords morphed into a more recognizable tune. Quiff-boy's eyes brightened in recognition as the melody of The Cookies' 'I Want a Boy For My Birthday' met his ears. He looked up, meeting Johnny's eyes over the top of his book. Johnny couldn't see his lips but could guess the smile by the crinkling of his blue eyes.  
He would have to bring his guitar to work more often.


	2. Chapter 2

_He has good taste in music,_ Steven thought glumly, _Of course he has good taste in music. It's just my luck._

'Johnny,' as his name tag read- the few times Steven had seen him wearing it- had played The Cookies on his guitar which meant that he had not only heard of them but liked them enough to learn a song. Steven had never met anyone his age who listened to the same 60's girl bands as him, let alone as attractive as the barista. Steven thought of the way the shorter boy's bangs fell over his doe-eyes while he was playing guitar or working the coffee machines and groaned.

"Wassa ma'er, love?" asked Effie, the owner of the library. She was a kind older woman who had taken a liking to him after years of his hanging around the library, reading every book he could get a hold of, and offered him a job.

"Oh, only the terrible woes of being young, dear Effie," he told her melodramatically. She simply laughed, swatting at the back of his head and making him grin back at her.

"What's his name?" she asked.

"How do you know it's a 'he'? Could be a 'she.' Or neither for that matter."

"Made a guess," she told him, sitting down with him at the front desk. "So, what is his name?"

"Johnny, " Steven told her, "and he'll probably never love me!"

"Oh hush, who wouldn't love you?" she said, pinching his cheek and grinning. _The majority of the human race, to start with,_ Steven thought. "That wouldn't be the Mahers' boy, would it?"

"I dunno," Steven replied, resting his head on his arms.

"Sweet boy, that one. Helped me carry in shipments of books once."

"That'd probably be him," Steven grumbled.

"Well, go get him!" Effie told him.

"I can't !" Steven groaned, "He plays guitar and he probably has friends who aren't 73 year old women and he likes The Cookies and he's too perfect!"

"Well love, it'll just be his loss if he doesn't realize that you're perfect too," she said, standing up. "Besides, you know I'm not a day over 55," she winked before going to organise the back room. Steven groaned once more, dropping his head back onto the table.


	3. Chapter 3

There was a flower shop on Steven's way to the coffee shop and the library, and the next morning as he passed he saw a tub filled with bunches of gladioli in the open door. He smiled at the flowers, deciding to make a quick stop.

..

When Quiff-boy walked in the coffee shop he was carrying a large bouquet of spikey flowers in addition to his book.  
Johnny had already gotten out a teacup and was getting it ready by the time Steven reached the counter and asked for "The usual?" with a sly grin.  
"So, those for your girlfriend or something?" Johnny asked, feining nonchalance.  
"No," Quiff-boy said, trailing his fingers over the soft petals and giving Johnny a moment to admire his delicate hands before dragging himself back to the tea. "I guess they're for me."  
"Y'know, gladiolus are supposed to mean infatuation or something," Johnny mused.  
"And can't I be infatuated with myself?"  
"Of course," Johnny told him, leaning across the counter on his elbows, "I wouldn't blame you in the slightest. It seems quite easy to me."  
Steven blushed brightly, taking his tea from Johnny and ignoring the pleasant feeling in his stomach as their fingers brushed. He smiled shyly and shuffled over to his usual couch and hid his face in his book, his neck pickling with the feeling of Johnny's eyes on him.  
He listened as Johnny began to strum his guitar again, humming along to the tune of 'Heaven Only Knows' by The Shangri-las. Steven began to softly sing along, the sound carrying across the empty coffeehouse.  
"I dream about you all the time, yes I do  
And I can't sleep at night  
(Heaven only knows)  
I dream about makin' you mine, yes I do  
And of holding you tight..."  
"You've got a funny voice," Johnny told him, still strumming.  
"Oh, I'm sorry," Quiff-boy said, straightening abruptly. "I- uh, I didn't mean to..."  
"No, I mean I like it," Johnny insisted. "Don't stop."  
"I have to go," Steven told him, cheeks burning, "Thank you for the tea."  
He grabbed his book and his flowers, rushing out and leaving Johnny standing alone.  
You've got a funny voice? Nice going, Johnny! He slumped down, groaning. Quiff-boy probably wouldn't come back and Johnny would probably never see him again and Quiff-boy was never going to love him and life could just be terrible sometimes.  
The ringing of the phone from the back room startled him and he hurried to pick up the receiver.  
"Hullo?"  
"Johnny! Hey, how's the shop doing?" asked his boss, Stephen from the other end.  
"It's fine," Johnny told him, "why?"  
"Oh, I just need you to start taking the afternoon shift if you can. Mike insists that there's better tips in the morning and he's threatening to quit it he can't have equal tips."  
Johnny snorted. It sounded so incredibly like his coworker to make such demands. Oh well, he'd probably already screwed up everything with Quiff-boy anyway. "Sure, I can take the afternoons."  
"Perfect! You start tomorrow. Thanks, Johnny!"  
"Sure," Johnny told him, picking his guitar back up.


	4. Chapter 4

The next morning when Steven walked into the coffee shop at exactly eleven o'clock, determined to talk to Johnny without just blushing and hiding behind his book, he was surprised to find the place free of any short guitar playing holders of his heart. Rather, a spikey haired boy stood behind the counter, arguing with a blond boy.  
"C'mon, Andy!" the first boy groaned, "Stephen said I'd get this shift to myself now! Johnny's always getting his fucking 25% tips! I want 25% too..."  
"I'm sorry that I just wanted to have the same shift as my boyfriend!"  
"I know, and that's sweet, but... 25%, Andy..."  
"Excuse me?" Steven asked, "I was just-"  
"Oh, customer!" The first boy- Mike by his name tag- exclaimed. "What do you want?"  
"Oh, I just wanted to know-er, where's Johnny?"  
"Not in right now. Changed shifts," Mike told him. "Can I get you anything?"  
"No thank you," Steven said sadly, walking out.  
He probably switched shifts so that he wouldn't have to see me, he thought, I knew he was too perfect for me.  
...  
Johnny held out hope that Quiff-boy would be there that afternoon, but was disappointed. The coffee shop became a terribly boring place without the anticipation of seeing the bookish young man. He found himself seeing the blue of Quiff-boy's eyes in the accents painted along the back wall, or thinking he heard the lilt of his voice among the usual chatter of the shop and being mistaken.  
By the end of the day he had given up, resigned to finding the boy himself.  
The next morning he stopped at the flower shop, buying a bouquet of gladiolus and walking to the library.  
"Hello, Effie," he greeted, stepping inside.  
"Oh, Johnny!" She grabbed him into a hug, "Those for me?"  
"M'afraid not, Eff. Is he around? Y'know, uh," he made a vague hand gesture above his head, trying to imitate the hair that gave Quiff-boy his nickname.  
"Steven? Not yet, love. Should be in a moment. Why, you wouldn't be here to return his affections, now would you?"  
"I'll have to get back to you when I know if there are affections to be returned," he told her. Just then, Steven walked in, surprised by Johnny's presence.  
"Johnny! What are you doing here?"  
"I wanted to bring you these," he held out the flowers. "'M sorry if I offended you the other day. They switched my shift at work so I didn't get to apologize."  
"That's okay, I didn't mind," Steven took the flowers carefully. "I thought you'd switched shifts on purpose..."  
"What, to avoid you? Sorry, Steven, but you're not getting away that easily."  
Steven cringed.  
"Sorry," Johnny started, "I was just-"  
"No, I just hate my name," Steven told him sheepishly.  
"That's okay," Johnny laughed, "What do you want me to call you? Stevie? Stevo?"  
"No! Those are horrible," Steven joined in his laughter.  
"How about I just call you 'love' until you figure it out."  
"Alright," Steven blushed.  
Effie coughed, reminding them that she was just behind the desk. "I'll just go organize some more. You boy's have fun."  
Once she had gone they both broke into grins.  
"I missed you," Johnny told him.  
"Me too," Steven agreed, looking down at the flowers. "You know, I've been told that these mean infatuation..."  
"You bet your ass they do!" Johnny grinned wickedly before pulling the other boy into a kiss.


End file.
